When Products Feel Special: Low Fluency Leads to Enhanced Desirability

Existing research posits that feelings of high fluency which signal familiarity with an object improve its evaluation (e.g. Schwarz 2004, Winkielman et. al 2003). In a departure from those findings, we demonstrate that low fluency can sometimes enhance evaluation of a product. We argue that in the context of special occasion goods, higher fluency which indicates abundance of the product makes the products feel less special, and this translates into lower value. We further show that effect of fluency on evaluation depends on naive theory that people use at the time of judgment that varies by different consumption contexts.



Citation:

Anastasiya Pocheptsova, Aparna A. Labroo, and Ravi Dhar (2009) ,"When Products Feel Special: Low Fluency Leads to Enhanced Desirability", in NA - Advances in Consumer Research Volume 36, eds. Ann L. McGill and Sharon Shavitt, Duluth, MN : Association for Consumer Research, Pages: 8-11.

Authors

Anastasiya Pocheptsova, University of Maryland, USA
Aparna A. Labroo, University of Chicago, USA
Ravi Dhar, Yale University, USA



Volume

NA - Advances in Consumer Research Volume 36 | 2009



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